Ethan Frome eBook

They went back to the kitchen, and he fetched the
coal and kindlings and cleared out the stove for her,
while she brought in the milk and the cold remains
of the meat-pie. When warmth began to radiate
from the stove, and the first ray of sunlight lay
on the kitchen floor, Ethan’s dark thoughts
melted in the mellower air. The sight of Mattie
going about her work as he had seen her on so many
mornings made it seem impossible that she should ever
cease to be a part of the scene. He said to himself
that he had doubtless exaggerated the significance
of Zeena’s threats, and that she too, with the
return of daylight, would come to a saner mood.

He went up to Mattie as she bent above the stove,
and laid his hand on her arm. “I don’t
want you should trouble either,” he said, looking
down into her eyes with a smile.

She flushed up warmly and whispered back: “No,
Ethan, I ain’t going to trouble.”

“I guess things’ll straighten out,”
he added.

There was no answer but a quick throb of her lids,
and he went on: “She ain’t said anything
this morning?”

“No. I haven’t seen her yet.”

“Don’t you take any notice when you do.”

With this injunction he left her and went out to the
cow-barn. He saw Jotham Powell walking up the
hill through the morning mist, and the familiar sight
added to his growing conviction of security.

As the two men were clearing out the stalls Jotham
rested on his pitch-fork to say: “Dan’l
Byrne’s goin’ over to the Flats to-day
noon, an’ he c’d take Mattie’s trunk
along, and make it easier ridin’ when I take
her over in the sleigh.”

Ethan looked at him blankly, and he continued:
“Mis’ Frome said the new girl’d
be at the Flats at five, and I was to take Mattie then,
so’s ’t she could ketch the six o’clock
train for Stamford.”

Ethan felt the blood drumming in his temples.
He had to wait a moment before he could find voice
to say: “Oh, it ain’t so sure about
Mattie’s going-”

“That so?” said Jotham indifferently;
and they went on with their work.

When they returned to the kitchen the two women were
already at breakfast. Zeena had an air of unusual
alertness and activity. She drank two cups of
coffee and fed the cat with the scraps left in the
pie-dish; then she rose from her seat and, walking
over to the window, snipped two or three yellow leaves
from the geraniums. “Aunt Martha’s
ain’t got a faded leaf on ’em; but they
pine away when they ain’t cared for,”
she said reflectively. Then she turned to Jotham
and asked: “What time’d you say Dan’l
Byrne’d be along?”

The hired man threw a hesitating glance at Ethan.

“Round about noon,” he said.

Zeena turned to Mattie. “That trunk of
yours is too heavy for the sleigh, and Dan’l
Byrne’ll be round to take it over to the Flats,”
she said.

“I’m much obliged to you, Zeena,”
said Mattie.

“I’d like to go over things with you first,”
Zeena continued in an unperturbed voice. “I
know there’s a huckabuck towel missing; and I
can’t take out what you done with that match-safe
’t used to stand behind the stuffed owl in the
parlour.”